Clearing the way for transport innovation
A paper published in the IPTS (Institute for prospective technological studies) report (October 2000 edition) has identified seven different 'policy packages' which could help in technological innovation in European transport policy. The high level group established by the European ministers of Transport in April 1999 to look into the area found six distinct barriers to technological innovation in the area of transport. They were - lack of awareness of available information - regulatory and legal barriers - technical barriers - financial and commercial barriers - societal barriers - decision-making barriers The report recognises that three different areas need to evolve together for technological innovation to come about: the technology itself, the institutions in the sector concerned and the culture required to bring in the innovation. Helping European transport policy include more innovatory measures requires each of the above areas to adapt more, the report says. It goes on to list a number of suggested measures that could positively impact innovation in transport policy - Structural measures that could help include increased liberalisation and harmonisation of fields such as environment regulation and fuel taxation. - Technology measures should look at which areas of transport are best served by European research rather than national research. The report gives aeronautics as a good example of where this applies and also suggests that European Union-funded pilot projects can be used as a useful way of disseminating information about new transport solutions. - Compatibility measures is important in the context of transport innovative solutions as it can provide a standard measure for all of Europe - important too in the respect that investment in transport solution is both long term and capital intensive. - Cultural measures should be moulded by European transport policy, and this has happened in recent years with Green and White papers assisting in provision of innovative technologies and raising public awareness of their uses. In its conclusion, the report presents the possible seven possible policy packages which it feels address the transport policy issues from a technological standpoint. These are the following: - a propulsion package recognising that propulsion technology is largely driven from the regulatory side and there is little scope to redirect research and development (R&D) funding to complement national and industrial R&D - an urban package addressing the relationship of transport to land use within an urban context - an intermodality package requires a number of actions such as regulatory changes, new R&D and more uptake of intermodal technologies - an aeronautics package which foresees a need for greater safety research as well as increased certification and standardisation procedures - a rail package which endorses start-up funding for technologies such as urban rail technologies and advanced people mover technologies. - a navigation and travel information package which advocates European policy putting greater focus on producing sophisticated solutions for standardisation, interoperability and data protection issues for communication and information technologies - a traffic management, communication and payment package, which looks at interactive technologies and how best to address them. There is already a great deal of R&D looking into these areas, so the next development at EU level could be to ensure that these innovations work together (such as establishing a common standard in traffic management). The report recognises that these packages just touch on the major issues and there is more to be done in fostering transport innovation. 'These seven packages can only sketch where future areas of action for European transport innovation policy could lie,' it says, mentioning other key areas that need analysis such as teleactivites, miniaturisation, reuse of materials and the development of new transport streams.